I can read pretty well... Still workin on the harder stuff though. What about everybody else. I have these questions...

How many people can read music? How many people use tab? How many people want to read but can't? And how many people think reading is a waste of time? Who can sort of read?








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-Luke

I can read music because I had to learn to read it in 4th grade, when I started playing the trumpet for band until high school..I guess you can call that a 'cheaters' or 'default' way of having to learn lol. For some reason it seemed easy, maybe because you can retain more or something when you're younger... I can also read tab, which I learned to read in high school when I started playing guitar.

same as the last guy...i started out in band in middle school...i still have some trouble with some guitar stuff..it's way more info to remember then high school trumpet.

I actually played violin back in 3rd and 4th grade but lost all knowledge of that and had to start from scratch Though the second time around I learned much more and learned to read much better and somehow my previous lost knowledge helped me out.








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-Luke

I know how to read music when it comes to singing but not with the guitar. lol i don't even know how to read tabs. I just like teaching myself.

I WAS SHOCKED TO FIND OUT THAT PLAYERS IN BANDS LIKE "KILLSWITCH ENGAGE" AND "LAMB OF GOD" ONLY RECENTLY "GOT IT!" ON GUITAR! THESE GUYS ARE GREAT AND IT MADE ME FEEL BETTER ABOUT MY SLOPPY PLAYING.....EVEN I HAVE HOPE.

I can read music, I think it's very important to be able to. I usually use tabs anyway just because I'm lazy.

i think reading is very important... i mean if you want a carreer for guitar... or anything else... you could be given a piece of music that you are expected to play. I know how to read tab... sort of but not easily enough i can play a tune smoothly using it because it doesnt use time signatures, keys, etc. you have to know the song to be able to play it and make it sound like the real thing. Comparing Reading to Tab is like comparing a novel to a picture book (lol not a good metaphor... i'll work on it) ooo how about reading to tab is... ahh forget there's no need for this








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-Luke

I can only read bass clef, and I haven't done it in a really long time so I doubt I still can. I think that for most music it is not necessary, and instead it is more important to have good ears and good listening skills.

Written music to me can really rob the music of its personality, because it becomes too precise to involve any creativity. I once heard a classical guitarist talking on NPR about how his instructor yelled at him for changing the fingerings in a piece he was performing, and I thought to myself about how glad I am to not be that guy: a phenomenal guitarist who is not allowed any more self expression than a robot.

Written music is helpful for precise communication of music, but with so few people using it, its just not really practical. It's like speaking to your friends in Latin- its classical, its classy, its pretentious, its scientific, and it was necessary to get to what we have today, but its just not going to bring anything great to the table.

Well, I guess it depends on the kind of person you are... I mean if you just like to jam, play with your band then I guess you're going for tab but if you are going to be writing classical pieces with a lot time changes, repeats, rests thats impossible to memorize you're going to use written music. It is too diverse... I wouldn't be surprised if someone came up with something between the two. Tab and Writing. Or I'm just dreaming? I'm not sure








_________________
-Luke

luke wrote:

Well, I guess it depends on the kind of person you are... I mean if you just like to jam, play with your band then I guess you're going for tab but if you are going to be writing classical pieces with a lot time changes, repeats, rests thats impossible to memorize you're going to use written music. It is too diverse... I wouldn't be surprised if someone came up with something between the two. Tab and Writing. Or I'm just dreaming? I'm not sure

Look up "Powertab"

I meant more of a whole new type of way to read but I guess that'll do just fine lol thanks... I can use this...








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-Luke

I read. It saves a lot of time.

Reading music is nothing more than Speed Learning.
Think about this: If you saw the word "CAT" written on a page in front of your face, you SHOULD be able to say that word out loud and have everybody around you know what it was you just read.

This is the best advice I can give anybody who wants to try to learn how to read music: Learn to sing what you see on that page. The reason? You can play anything you can sing.

Tabs are nice for learnig a part but try giving one to a Tenor Sax player!!

Don't let anybody tell you that once you can read you will only sound you play in a box. Randy Rhodes didn't.
But to each their own. It is quite a bit of work and you do have to stay on top of it.
As a young and impressionable lad I was lucky enough to attend a Guitar seminar with studio ace GIT founder Howard Roberts.
He told me that when things got stale he would go and grab lesson books for other instruments and learn their chops! Trumpet, Mandolin, Sax, anything to shake it up a bit.
Y'wanna see some shred chops waiting to happen? Check out what many woodwind players have to deal with!!!








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Play what you want, play what you feel and don't look so suprised when the people you play for don't get it.

I guess when I hear "reading" I think "sight-reading" like playing on the fly what is written. I can sit down and figure out what is going on in a brass or woodwinds part but I would just take forever.

I think that it is good to know about notes so that you can figure things out, but I don't think you need to be able to read it so fast on the fly because guitar music just isn't really used that way.

benitosuave wrote:

I guess when I hear "reading" I think "sight-reading" like playing on the fly what is written. I can sit down and figure out what is going on in a brass or woodwinds part but I would just take forever.

I think that it is good to know about notes so that you can figure things out, but I don't think you need to be able to read it so fast on the fly because guitar music just isn't really used that way.

Sight-reading is not for the faint of heart!
I have done quite a bit of theatre over the years and I'm telling you, those scores show no mercy. All of the arrangers in the business like to make life easy on the Horn players so the Guitar score often times pays the price by being in a key like F#, Gb and one time (swear to God on this) Cb!!! Key changes, time signature changes, and they can be full of errors too! Nothing beats playing exactly what was written only to find out that it's wrong becuse the poor schmuck that did the copying screwed it up. Having Director that likes to just change shit left and right doesn't help either. They may decicde to drop an entire section of a song (of course it is the part you spent two hours on the night before), so you have to be able to roll with the punches.

Here is another exercise for anybody who wants to try.
Take a piece of music (If you are new to this stuff use a piece from a song you already know) and stare at the first eight measures for five minutes.
When the time is up, turn the music over so you can't see it and play as much of it as you can by memory.








_________________
Play what you want, play what you feel and don't look so suprised when the people you play for don't get it.